The City That Never Sleeps Takes On Salt

September 15, 2015

New York State just announced it will set a $15 minimum for all industries—not just for QSR workers—and now comes word that New York City is going after salt.

The city’s Board of Health is requiring chain restaurants to add salt-shaker symbols next to menu items with at least a day’s worth of sodium, which the U.S. Food and Drug Administration defines as 2,300 milligrams, or about a teaspoon’s worth. According to one official quoted in The New York Times: “It’s quite difficult for consumers to understand which products might have too much sodium in them.”

Some might shrug and take the directive with a grain of salt. But the state’s restaurant operators oppose the tweak to menus and menu boards; one lamented that restaurants are on a path to offering “more warning labels than food products.”

However, since the decision to add salt warnings was voted in by the Health Department rather than by elected officials, it may go the way of the erstwhile soda ban and get a thumbs-down from City Hall.